


were we the belly of the beast or the sword that fell (we'll never tell)

by madasthesea



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, F/M, Flashbacks, better safe than sorry, blood warning, but I put the warning on, it's not really that graphic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-04
Updated: 2014-09-04
Packaged: 2018-02-16 03:28:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2254140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madasthesea/pseuds/madasthesea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"To be someone’s partner meant to trust each other completely. To be able to predict the other’s move and act accordingly. To protect them at all costs. To be their shield."</p>
<p>If Jemma had known at their first meeting what her new partner Leopold Fitz would mean to her, she probably wouldn’t have been so inclined to reach for her gun. A Fitzsimmons Special Operatives AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	were we the belly of the beast or the sword that fell (we'll never tell)

**Author's Note:**

> This is for the Agents of SHIELD Big Bang Round 2, so I had the wonderful privilege of working with Becca at ellahitzgerald on Tumblr. She put together a fantastic fanmix called Drop Your Guard, which is available on 8tracks, or linked from her Tumblr. The title is from "The Stable Song" by Gregory Alan Isakov.

_"Agent Simmons,” someone called from behind her. She turned, smile already forming before she sees Agent Johnson fighting her way toward her, a curly haired young man bobbing along behind her. She keeps the smile in place—bright and open—but nerves erupted in her stomach as she was beckoned to follow the duo._

“Ah, it’s good to be home,” Simmons says happily as they step off the plane at Heathrow. “Well, closer to home.”

Fitz nods enthusiastically, his duffle bag slung over his shoulder. They are there to collect a piece of alien metal that a tourist had tried to bring back from New York. Practically every SHIELD agent was working overtime to gather every scrap of metal that had littered New York. They don’t know what dangerous properties the foreign metal could contain.

They’re met at the gate by a driver sent by the containment facility that was housing the substance. It’s an hour and half drive from Heathrow to the town in Kent. The driver is silent and apparently uninterested in them, so they talk only to each other. Simmons tells Fitz about her family trips down to Newhaven, where her aunt lived, and how she liked to look at the tide pools there. Fitz admits he’s never been this far south, but that he had been down to Workington once and had loved every minute of it. It’s almost a shame when they arrive and need to pull themselves back to reality and their mission.

Not that it is very difficult. They flash their badges to anyone who looks like they might question them and the security let them pass almost without a word. They are led to a room with the walls lined with what looked like safety deposit boxes. An elderly man opens one with a standard metal key, and takes out the small box inside. He opens it and shows them the piece of metal about the size of a hand, looking like it had come from one of the crafts the Chitauri had used. They take the box, placing it in a biohazard box they had brought with them and are on their way again.

It’s evening when they reach their hotel. They don’t fly out until the next morning, which is sort of frustrating. It isn’t really enough time to go visit either of their parents, but still enough that it is really tempting to try. They manage to distract each other by walking around London, eating dinner in a pub Jemma remembered from trips with her mom and dad, visiting nearby famous sites that Fitz had never seen.

They’re lost in the sea of people on the streets, enjoying the cloudless night. They wander for a while, eating in a corner pub, before making their way back to the hotel. Fitz lays awake for a long time, listening to Simmons breathe.

_As she fell into step next to the boy, she glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. He was not looking at her, but she could tell by the way he jutted his chin up, shoulders tense, that he could feel her gaze. She fought the instinct to look away. He was taller than her, but thin and bony in a way most agents were not. His arms were long and loose by his sides, but his fingers were tapping unknown rhythms and patterns against his legs as he walked. It made Simmons feel like he was itching to draw his gun._

They’re sent to Blackwater, Arizona, a town that was home to barely one thousand people, twice that many cacti, and one possible “gifted.” There have been reports of thunderstorms appearing out of nowhere. In a small desert town like Blackwater, that is a big deal. They get a lot of looks when they pull up in their large black SUV.

“It’s too bloody hot here,” Fitz complains the moment they get out of the car.

“So you’ve said. Multiple times,” Simmons responds, a barely visible smile on her face as she looks around. They’re parked in front of the only visibly occupied building; a combination bar, hotel, and restaurant.

“Thank goodness,” Fitz says, already approaching the door to the restaurant. “I’m starving.”

They don’t talk much as they eat. The small diner is full enough to prohibit conversation concerning their mission here. And they are used to being in silence together.

When they pay for the meal, they stop their waitress and ask, quietly, where they can find Samuel West. She gives them directions hesitantly, and they smile their thanks. They can feel the stares on their backs as they leave.

They find Sam at the address they were given, but they aren’t allowed in the house until his mother has examined each of their SHIELD badges with the utmost scrutiny. She seats them in the living room, grudgingly offers them lemonade which they decline, and then calls Sam from his room. They had been told that the boy was only fourteen, but it is still a shock to see him—barely 5’6”, white blond hair, electric blue eyes, thinner even than Fitz—standing in front of them, posture cocky to hide the fear in his eyes.

“Sam,” Jemma begins, because this was her area, this was what she excelled in. “We’re here to talk to you about the storms that have been occurring recently and your possible involvement—“ She stops short because the boy has started to laugh, looking at her like she is an idiot.

“My involvement?” He asks, with a voice that was high and too loud after the softness of Jemma’s. “For a “super-secret” intelligence organization, you two are awfully thick. I _create_ the storms. I control them.”

“So, you’re aware of your ability. Not all people can accept the fact that they are gifted without the help of SHIELD.” Jemma is trying very hard to keep her voice steady and calm—there was little she hated quite as much as her intelligence being insulted.

“Of course I’m aware. And I also know what people like you do to people like me. And there’s no way I’m coming with you to be some kind of lab rat!” The air crackles, the smell of ozone filling the room. Fitz gives her a wide-eyed look.

“Sam, no one’s going to use you for tests,” she says, cautiously, and Fitz nods enthusiastically in agreement next to her.

“Then why are you here?” Sam shouts back, electricity sparking at the end of his fingers.

“To protect you!” The electricity stops arcing between his fingers.

“Like a rock star?” He asks, the corner of his mouth twitching into a smirk.

Jemma has to fight to not roll her eyes, but replies, “Yes. Like a rock star.”

He’s more cooperative after that. It takes a lot of convincing—and a lot of ignoring rude comments about their lack of intelligence, poor attempts at flirtation with Simmons, and questions about how Fitz ever got to be a SHIELD agent when he looks like he could lift less than Sam—but they finally get him all signed up on the Index, assign him a handler (which they had to call a body guard) and give him the “Guidelines for Gifted People” pamphlet.

Sam’s mother ushers them out without so much as a “have a nice day” and they are both equally grateful to put Blackwater in their rearview mirror.

“Do you think we’ll be allowed to stop and see the Grand Canyon?” Jemma asks as Fitz speeds down the two lane highway.

“After dealing with that little twerp, we’d better be,” he grumbles.

They are.

_“Jemma Simmons, this is Agent Leopold Fitz. You have been assigned to be partners.”_

 

A hacker by the alias of “Chaos” is causing SHIELD serious problems. He would steal vital information, leave viruses, and basically just wreak havoc. There is also the possibility of him selling information to organizations such as Centipede. Fitz and Simmons are told to get the technology lock-down bracelet on him whatever the cost. Find out how much he knows about SHIELD, how much Centipede now knows. If necessary, apprehend him. There’s a pair of handcuffs in Fitz’s jacket pocket. It bumps against his gun holster often enough to annoy him.

It’s raining when they arrive in Dublin—the hacker’s last known location—and they both stand under an awning for several minutes just staring out into the street. They didn’t want this mission. It wasn’t their style.

They take a bus from the airport into the city center, and then cross the river, following the path the GPS showed them. It leads them to an inn just across from Trinity College. They exchange a look at the thought that a college student might be the one threatening all of SHIELD.

The woman working at the front desk of the hotel gives them the room number without a fuss. Once upstairs, Fitz picks the lock while Jemma watches the hall.

The room they enter does not seem like the place a hacker would choose to operate. It’s practically spotless, for one thing. There are no computers, wireless routers, not even a laptop.

“Are we sure this is the right spot?” Fitz asks. Jemma shrugs, looking around her as if hoping to spot something to prove they hadn’t come for nothing.

Just as they’re about to give up their search, the door opens. A young man, probably no older that mid-20’s, is standing there, a backpack slung over his shoulder. He looks at them for a moment, takes in their black clothes and boots, the gun barely visible in the waistband of Fitz’s jeans. Then he bolts.

They take off after him, Jemma in the lead, Fitz one her heels, moaning something like “why do they always run?” Fitz takes him down with a flying leap, sending them both tumbling down the stairs.

The three people in the lobby freeze and stare at them—“Chaos” pinned to the ground by Fitz, Jemma skidding to a halt at the top of the stairs.

“Honestly, Leo,” Jemma chides, trying to sound lighthearted. “You’re such a klutz.”

The lady behind the desk chuckles awkwardly before returning her attention to the customers. Fitz stands stiffly, pulling the hacker up in was that was probably supposed to look friendly.

“If you don’t cooperate, my partner and I are not afraid to make you,” Fitz whispers, then lets go of his collar and gestures up the stairs. They walk back to his room, the door still swinging wide open, and usher him in. Jemma locks the door behind them.

Fitz pulls the desk chair into the middle of the room. “Sit,” he commands and the hacker obeys reluctantly.

“Tell us your name,” Jemma says as Fitz grabs the discarded backpack and begins removing everything in it.

“My name is Chaos,” he says, looking surprisingly smug for someone who had just tried to escape and failed miserably.

“Your real name.”

“James Butler,” he answers, somewhat sulkily.

“James,” Jemma repeats. “What do you know about Project Centipede?”

“Nothing.” So far Fitz has found a laptop, a phone charger, three memory drives, and several granola bars.

“Tell the truth,” Jemma says without missing a beat.

“I know they don’t like you,” is James’s only response.

It goes on like this for a long time; Jemma and Fitz asking questions, getting practically nothing in return. At one point, when they’re speaking quietly to each other, their heads bent close so James wouldn’t hear, he tries to make a run for it. He springs out of his chair, grabs the laptop sitting on the foot of the bed, and makes for the door. But Jemma just slides between him and the exit while Fitz draws his gun. James looks like he might try to fight, but another look at the gun trained unwaveringly on his forehead and he gives up. He dumps the laptop back on the bed and returns to his chair. Fitz doesn’t lower his gun until Jemma has fastened the handcuffs on James’ wrists.

“Did you really think you’d be able to get out of here? We do this for a living. You sit behind a computer screen and sell international secrets for money,” Fitz spits at him.

“Only what I can figure out,” James mutters tiredly.

“What do you mean?” Jemma asks calmly, before Fitz can even open his mouth.

“All of SHIELD’s files are encrypted. I can always break in and get them, but I usually can’t find a cypher that can translate the information.”

Both Jemma and Fitz try to hide their surprise at this. They, and their superior officers, were sure that a good amount of vital information had been leaked. The fact that James had only understood a small amount was definitely good news.

“Well,” Fitz says, “it looks like we’re finally getting somewhere. But if you can’t understand the files, why go to the trouble of stealing them?”

“Because I need to do something to stop corrupt government organizations like SHIELD, and the NSA, and the IRA from taking over the world! If putting a Trojan Horse in their servers prevents them from covering up another alien invasion or rebellion, than I did something worthwhile!”

Fitz gives Jemma a look that makes her have to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing.

“Right,” he says slowly. “Well, James, I think you’ve told us all we need to know.”

“So, you’re letting me go?”

“Yep. Just let me take the cuffs off,” he replies, stepping over to unlock the handcuffs and snap on the bracelet.

“You know, for brainwashed minions of an evil organization you guys aren’t so bad. What did you just put on my wrist?”

“A bracelet that lets us track everything you do on a computer based device—mobile phones, computers, ATM’s—and shut it down if we think you’re doing something bad.” James looks up at them, any sort of fond feeling he had for them disappearing in an instant. “Oh,” Fitz continues, “and we’re taking all your stuff.”

James looks utterly devastated. So much so that Jemma steps forward and puts a hand on his shoulder.

“I know you think you’re doing what’s best, but doing things like that actually hurts more people than helps. It’s just so we can keep on eye you. It could be worse,” she assures, but James doesn’t seem very inclined to listen anymore.

Fitz packs up the laptop and memory sticks in his own bag, gives a small salute to James, and then ushers Simmons out the door.

They hold their laughter in until they’re on the street.

“He was absolutely mental,” Fitz gasps, clutching his sides.

“I almost feel bad taking his stuff. He looked like a kicked puppy,” Jemma says, trying to wipe the smile off her face.

They set off down the street, Fitz still letting out the occasional chuckle, the rain drizzling onto their heads.

“Hey, what do you say we stop off at a pub and get a drink,” Fitz suggests. When Simmons bites her lip in concern, he adds “We got the job done; we don’t fly out until tomorrow afternoon. Come on, Jemma. When was the last time you had a pint in an actual pub?” That was enough to convince her and they set off down the street, looking for somewhere not too crowded.

They’re settled in a corner booth a few minutes later, sipping at their drinks, a football match neither of them are interested in playing on the television above their heads.

They don’t start talking until their second beer. Fitz breaks the silence by saying simply, “Leo?”

Jemma catches on immediately. “You wanted me to call you Fitz in the middle of that ridiculously awkward situation? That would just make it more awkw-“

“How would using the name you always call me make it mor-“

“Because most people don’t call each other by their last names!”

“They didn’t know it was my last name.”

“Right, because Fitz is such a common given name.”

“Probably more common than _Leo_.”

Jemma can’t help it: she laughs. He looks at her like she has deeply wounded him. It makes her laugh even harder. He watches her in bemusement for a moment before finding himself joining in and before either is aware of it, they’re laughing so hard tears are streaming down their faces and they’re both clutching their sides in agony.

It takes them a long time to calm down. Jemma is the first to get her breathing under control again, and she watches as Fitz takes shuddering breaths, tears still leaking from his eyes as he laughs.

“This is hard,” she says when Fitz is finally breathing properly again.

“What is?” He asks, seeming slightly concerned by her sudden change of mood.

“Being an agent. Travelling all the time and never seeing your family. Doing things you used to think were wrong. Telling people that they’re not allowed to do what they think is right. I feel… like I’m slowly becoming the bad guy.”

“Jemma,” Fitz says quietly, like he doesn’t know what else to say, but desperately wants to say something.

“Sorry, I just totally ruined the mood,” she mutters, laughing a little to brush off the sudden heaviness that surrounds them. “Forget about it.”

“Jemma,” he says again. “I don’t think you’re a bad person.”

She looks at him, at his earnest blue eyes in the dim yellow light of the pub, and suddenly feels like the weight of the world pressing on her shoulders has just been eased.

“Thank you,” she says, more honestly than she has said it in a very long time. She leans over the corner of the table and presses a soft kiss against his cheek bone. Then she stands up, gathers her bag and says “Come on, Fitz. We should go.”

They walk to their hotel in a warm silence.

 

_They both keep their faces perfectly still. It wasn’t as though she didn’t want to be partners with him, but to be someone’s partner meant to trust each other completely. To be able to predict the other’s move and act accordingly. To protect them at all costs. To be their shield._

 

They’re sent to Jinan, China and neither of them speaks a lick of Chinese. It’s supposed to be surveillance only—SHIELD believes a lab has been experimenting with alien technology—which they both appreciate for once.

They spend the first day watching the building under the guise of tourists. They stroll down the street, checking out the street vendors stalls under a bright sun. An elderly woman calls them a “beautiful couple” in halting English and gives them both little bead bracelets, to “bless the marriage.” Fitz finds himself staring at Jemma more often than not. It is easy to forget—with the fragrances of foreign foods in the air and the colors of carefully made jewelry glinting under the hot sun—that they both have a gun tucked into the back of their jeans and blood caked permanently under their nails. 

They slip up to the roof of the laboratory as the sun begins to set to wait until everyone has gone home for the night to slip in and take a look around. They settle down, watching the sun turn Daming Lake into a pool of gold.

“Did you ever think you would be here?” Jemma asks, quietly, as if afraid of disturbing the silence that had settled around them.

“Well, I always hoped I would visit China,” he answers.

“I meant an agent, going on missions,” Jemma says, exasperated.

“I know that’s what you meant,” Fitz replies quickly. “I was joking.” She nods, teasingly making a face like she isn’t sure she believes him. The silence envelops them again for a few minutes before Fitz speaks again.

“I don’t know. I mean, every little kid kind of dreams about being a secret agent. But I never really thought about it. But then I went to university in America and my roommates took me shooting and I hit the target dead center every time. Guns just always made sense to me. The physics of it made sense. And I guess it got around cause a few months later a SHIELD agent showed up at my door and asked me to join up.”

Jemma was watching him, but when he looked up she looked back toward the lake, just beginning to reflect the few stars that were visible.

“You never told me that,” she says. He shrugs.

“What about you? Did you always know you would be one of the best undercover agents SHIELD has to offer?” He asks, keen to move the attention away from his past and things he may not have told her.

“Absolutely not,” she scoffs. “I was a terrible liar when I was young. I preferred facts. Until I realized that lies—the best lies, the most believable lies—are 99% true. And after that, it became a sort of… experiment. I wanted to see just how I far I could take it. I wanted to know how much people would believe if most of it was true.”

Her voice is small, and there’s a tremor in it that enforces the truthfulness of her words. She sounds guilty, like she was ashamed that her career, her entire life, was built on lies.

“Hey,” he says without really thinking of what to say next. He just wanted her to stop looking so sad. When she looks at him, he stutters for a second before saying “If you hadn’t, you wouldn’t be here.” He gestures vaguely toward the lake in front of them, the sky that is starting to turn dark. He takes a deep breath. “You wouldn’t be with me.”

“Oh, Fitz,” she says and smiles at him in a way that tells him she’s grateful for his poor attempt, pats his knee, and then they lapse into slightly uncomfortable silence. After another half hour of the light steadily fading around them, he stands, stretching his stiff back, and then offers her a hand up. She takes it, just to be nice, and groans as her knees pop.

“We’re getting too old for this,” Fitz says. “I haven’t been able to stand without some joints cracking in years.” Simmons laughs and any lingering awkwardness is banished in the sound.

Fitz picks the lock on the door to the stairs and they begin making their way down. They’re just supposed to take a look around, see the facilities, technology, and security before reporting back how many men they think would be needed to take the lab down.

They walk as quietly as they can, shining their flashlights through windows into labs, entering rooms when they find unlocked doors. It isn’t until they reach the basement that they find anything of interest. There’s a single black door with the only electric security system in the building.

“Can you get through it?” Jemma asks Fitz in a whisper.

“With my bare hands,” he says, flashing her a grin. He carefully pries the front panel off and spends a few moments testing wires. Jemma shines her flashlight down the hall, keeping watch.

“Can I get a knife?”

She pulls one from her belt and hands it to him. He cuts a red wire and the door hisses open. He gives a victorious fist pump and they slip through.

The lab is huge. In the limited light of their flashlights they can see rows upon rows of workspaces and, lining one wall as far as they can see, glass cases of glowing blue vials. Each vial is carefully numbered and ordered.

“That’s definitely alien,” Jemma breathes. Fitz nods and takes a step closer to the glass. He reaches out, and before Jemma can call out to him, presses his hand against the nearest case. An alarm blares, so loud and sudden, Jemma drops her flashlight.

“Oh, bloody…” Fitz complains as red lights flash all around them and an automated voice announces that the lab will go into emergency shutdown in thirty seconds.

“Fitz, don’t just stand there, come on!” Simmons calls, scooping up her flashlight and turning to leave. But Fitz doesn’t seem to hear her. Instead, he slides open the door, picks up three of the blue vials, and begins wrapping them in several pairs of rubber gloves from a dispenser nearby.

“Ten, nine,” the voice counts down, just as Fitz is zipping up his bag with the vials stored inside. They both make a dash for the door, and slip out just in time for it to slam closed and lock itself.

“How long, do you think, until the police show up?” Fitz asks.

“I don’t know,” Jemma responds, “but our only exit is on the roof, so we’d better hope the rest of the building wasn’t put into emergency lockdown.”

Fitz looks sheepish, but Simmons just brushes past him to the stairs and begins jogging up them.

They make it to the roof without any other incidents, though they can hear sirens piercing the quiet of the night once they’re in the open. Fitz begins digging in his bag, pulling out carabineers and a long, black rope. Jemma grimaces at it, but allows him to begin tying the rope around her waist and hooking carabineers through her belt loops. They go to the edge of the roof, Fitz setting up a homemade pulley system, and Simmons sighs as she looks down, feeling faintly ill.

“Don’t drop me,” she says, looking up at Fitz.

“Show a little faith, Jemma,” is his reply, before beginning the rather arduous task of lowering her down. Once she reached the ground safely, he tied his end around his own waist and began his own descent, with Jemma acting as his counter-weight on the ground. The police are there by now, ramming the front door open and storming in. Fitz and Simmons don’t rush—they knew the roof would be the last place checked. They would be long gone before the police reached it.

They both untie the ropes when Fitz reaches the ground and make their silent way around to the front of the building, slipping past the flashing lights with ease. They rendezvous with a couple of local agents to pass of the vials and are on a plane away from China the next morning.

Fitz falls asleep against her shoulder. Jemma looks at him because, for once, he isn’t looking back. She stops when the woman across the aisle asks how long they’ve been married.

 

_“Before you go into the field together, you should know a bit about each other,” Agent Johnson said, smiling in an attempt to get the two new agents to relax. “We’ll start with Simmons. Born and raised in Sheffield, England. 20. Specialties are undercover work, strategic planning, and asset analysis. Fluent in French, German, and Russian.” It was weird, Simmons thought, to be sitting at a table next to a complete stranger, listening to someone who barely knew her first name talking about her like she was an expert. She didn’t like the impersonal way she was reduced to what she was good at. Agent Fitz was sitting next to her, nodding along as the briefing continued, “Weapon of choice: throwing knives. Scored 191 out of 200 on the written test, 157 on the physical. Very good with reading people and situations.”_

_Fitz was looking at her. She stared down at her hands until he looked away._

 

They receive word of a promising young woman in Kharkiv, Ukraine. They find her working the night shift at a rundown laundromat, where a single customer is sleeping in a chair as he waits for the dryer to finish.

“Zoya Holub?” Simmons asks, and the girl’s head shoots up, eyes widening. She’s pale, and tired looking, but her entire body seemed to vibrate with nervous energy. She slides almost imperceptibly into the shadows.

“Who are you?” She asks, dark eyes flitting between Fitz, Jemma, and the door.

“It’s alright,” Jemma soothes in Russian. The languages are similar enough that communication isn’t a problem, but the distrust in Zoya’s eyes increases. “We’re from an organization that appreciates people who have talent such as yours.”

“What’d you say?” Fitz whispers in her ear, but she shushes him, her attention focused entirely on the girl in front of them.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she insists, tears starting to brim in her eyes.

“We’ve been told that you have great skill with….” She hesitates, trying to think of a way to say ‘stealing’ without scaring Zoya further, “Procuring items of value. We believe this talent can be used for better purposes.”

“I’m sorry!” Zoya cries suddenly, tears streaming down her face, her hands shaking in terror. “Please, don’t hurt me!”

“We’re not here to hurt you!” Jemma says in English and Fitz looks confused and very concerned with the turn the conversation has taken. “We’re not here to hurt you,” she says again, in Russian. “We’re here to help you.”

The dryer buzzes, signaling the end of its cycle, but the man in the chair doesn’t stir. Fitz eyes him warily as Jemma steps forward.

“I promise. No one’s going to hurt you.”

Zoya seems to believe her, stepping into the dim light cast by a bare bulb.

“I’m afraid that’s not quite true,” a voice says suddenly, in gruff, harsh Russian. When Jemma turns to look, she sees the customer is out of his chair, pulling a gun from his large overcoat. Fitz’s own gun is already trained on him.

“Don’t move,” Fitz commands, but the man just laughs.

“Silly American,” the man says in heavily accented English. Fitz looks extremely offended. “This wench has stolen from me. It is my right.”

Jemma moves to block Zoya from sight, drawing a knife from her sleeve. The girl is sobbing uncontrollably, whispering apologies and prayers in rapid Ukrainian.

The man cocks his gun and raises it to point directly at Jemma and the cowering girl behind her. Fitz steps forward, gun still raised.

“I said, don’t move. You have no right to hurt that woman.” He does not seem to care, just continues to step closer toward Jemma.

“This is your punishment,” he threatens in quiet Russian, “for stealing from the Solntsevskaya Bratva.”

The girl wails, Jemma raises her knife to throw, and then a shot rings out. The Russian curses, his gun goes skittering away, and he cradles his now bleeding hand.

“I told you not to touch her,” Fitz says, his voice low, but confident.

The man roars in anger and lunges toward Fitz. Jemma throws her knife, and it slices across his arm before sliding under a washing machine. He grabs his arm in pain, whirling to face Jemma. She pulls another knife, this one long and straight, not meant for throwing.   

The Russian freezes for a moment, seeming to weigh his options. Fitz’s gun is still aimed between his eyes, Jemma is braced, her knife raised, ready for hand-to-hand combat. Zoya was trying to make herself as small as possible in the corner behind Jemma. He seems to come to a conclusion, and before any of them can react, he dives straight for Jemma. He grabs her around the waist and they both go tumbling into the corner. Zoya screams.

“Jemma!” Fitz shouts uselessly. He can’t fire for fear of hitting the wrong person. There are sounds of scuffling and grunting for a moment, and then everything goes still.

“Jemma?” He asks warily, taking cautious steps forward.

“I’m ok. So is Zoya,” she calls back and Fitz lets his arms drop for the first time, bracing them on his knees as he took a few calming breaths.

“Can you help me get him off me? He’s unconscious. I hit him with the hilt of my knife.” Fitz holsters his gun and steps forward, pulling the Russian off of Jemma with a bit of difficultly. He gives her a hand up and immediately begins checking for wounds. She has a cut on her cheek that’s bleeding sluggishly and scratches all over her arms, but she assures him she’s fine.

There’s a whimper behind them and they both turn to see Zoya, brandishing Jemma’s knife with shaking hands.

“It’s alright, he’s unconscious. You’re safe now,” Jemma says, and takes a step forward, but Zoya swings the knife wildly and she jerks back.

“Stay away from me! Stay away!” She screams, springing to her feet and making a bolt for the door.

“Hang on,” Fitz calls, making as if to catch her arm, but she slashes wildly, connecting with his chest and he draws back with a cry of pain. Zoya makes it to the door, looks back at them with terror written across her face, then runs into the night.

“Are you alright?” Jemma asks after a moment of shocked silence. He nods slightly, but she pulls him under the light and starts checking his wound.

“What should we do with him?” Fitz asks as Jemma examines him.

“Tie him up and call the police.”

“I think he’s part of a gang.”

“Yeah, it sounded like it,” Jemma agrees. “You’ll probably need stitches.”

Fitz presses a shirt from the Russian man’s load against the wound to soak up the blood and they wait in silence for the police. They come a few minutes later, shove the still unconscious Russian into the back of their car, and thank them profusely for the help. In exchange for their service, they offer to drive the two agents to the hospital to get checked.

Once Fitz’s chest was stitched, Simmons’ cheek was disinfected, and they were both fed a cold dinner, they returned to the room above a bar they were staying at. They both collapsed into their beds, almost too exhausted to change.

“Jemma,” Fitz says after a minute of shuffling around. At her hum to indicate that she’s listening, he says “We are never coming back to Ukraine.”

    

_“Agent Fitz,” Agent Johnson continued, oblivious to the discomfort of both young agents, “was born and raised in Glasgow, Scotland. 21. Speaks French and basic Spanish. Specializes in sharpshooting, bomb engineering, and risk analysis. One of the best shooters we’ve got. 179 on the written test, 174 on the physical. Very quick thinker and good under pressure.”_

_Simmons tried not to look at Fitz like she was sizing him up, but she was surprised by his high marks and Agent Johnson’s obvious pride in his abilities. She had heard of a Scottish boy who could shoot almost as well as Barton: she hadn’t pictured him to be like this._

 

A company in Villa Nueva, Guatemala had been selling extremely advanced weaponry to drug cartels. SHIELD wanted to know how they had developed such advanced guns, and sent Fitzsimmons to retrieve the schematics. After four days of surveying the building, they went in undercover with the aid of Fitz’s rudimentary Spanish and Simmons’s silver tongue.

They had been told the information was stored on a computer on the sixth floor, so they make their way up, pick a couple locks to get into the restricted access office, and begin downloading the files.

They are just sharing a smile at their success when a gunshot makes them both flinch; Fitz ducks while Simmons dives for the memory stick still plugged into the computer. Another shot and suddenly Jemma’s on her knees, practically choking on a breath, hands going to her side. Fitz swears, peeking over the desk only to withdraw quickly as three more bullets whistle over their heads. Jemma is sucking in deep, shaky breaths, but pulls her gun and aims toward the two men firing from the doorway. Under the cover of her fire Fitz reaches up and pulls the drive from its slot and slides it into his boot where he knows he won’t lose it.

After firing five shots, forcing the men to hide behind the door frame, Jemma collapses against the filing cabinet, her hands returning to her side. Fitz crawls over to her, his breath coming fast and shallow, fear coursing ice cold through his veins. He crouches next to her and pulls her blood slick hands from her side, trying to diagnose the damage while choking back the bile rising in his throat. The bullet had ripped through her at an angle, entering a couple inches to the right of her belly button and exiting just around the curve of her side.

“Ok, Jemma. You’re fine. You’re ok,” he mutters, words streaming together in her mind from the haze of pain. He has nothing to stem the flow of blood with, nothing to bind the wound except her weak hands pressing against her skin. But there’s no time for him to try to help, he can already hear the men outside shuffling cautiously to the door. So he stands, pulling her up with him by the arm, and tries to ignore the scream that escapes her. He braces her against him, pulling his gun from the holster on his hip and firing two shots. The men fall, and he wraps his arm too tight around her, blood hot under his fingers, and pulls her toward the doorway.

The sound of pounding feet is getting closer, coming from the right, so Fitz turns left, tripping just a little, and tugs Jemma as fast as he can down the hall. Men are shouting behind them and no matter how many corners he turns, they seem to be right behind him. He glances over his shoulder and swears. There’s a small trail of blood leading directly to them. He looks at Simmons, her head falling against his shoulder, her eyes unfocused and glassy. Her hand is placed over his, pushing it against her wound even though he knows it must be agony. He’s impressed she’s still standing. He keeps moving.  

There’s another shout, closer this time and he knows guards are about to come spilling around the corner. So he shoves Jemma none too gently into a niche in the wall, where she slides to the ground, her head lolling against her chest. He takes the gun from her unresponsive fingers and turns to face their pursuers. The handle is slick with blood, but he raises it with steady hands and shoots down the two men who come barreling down the hall first. The two who follow meet the same fate, collapsing to the ground in a spreading pool of crimson. Another guard comes around the corner more carefully, gun trained right on Fitz, and Fitz dives behind the corner, eliciting a small moan of pain from Simmons when he rams into her.

“We’ve got to find a way out,” he shouts to her over the rapid gunfire, trying to find her spare clip.

Jemma’s mouth is pressed into a hard line, and he can tell she’s biting the inside of her cheek to keep from whimpering with pain. Her hands are holding her side, but not tightly enough to stop the blood that’s still flowing from the wound. Her face is pale and covered in a thin sheen of sweat.

“Stay awake,” he orders her. She glares at him out of the corner of her eye and he shoots her a pale smile.

When the gunfire stops he leans just far enough to see the guard still standing there, replacing the magazine on his gun. Fitz shoots him in the stomach.

“Ok, Simmons, time to go,” he says, grabbing her arm and pulling her to her feet. She bites back a scream and does her best to keep her feet, letting Fitz pull her further down the hall.

They run, as best they can, through hallway after hallway, Jemma’s breathing loud and harsh in Fitz ear. They dodge behind corners and into empty rooms whenever they see someone, trying not to attract the attention a gunshot would bring. However, after less than ten minutes, Jemma goes completely slack against Fitz’s side. He curses, dragging her into a nearby closet and lowers her to the ground.

“Jemma,” he says, shaking her. She moans, but doesn’t wake up. He curses again. Someone will have sounded an alarm by now. Police would be speeding their way towards them. They are trapped on the sixth floor, Simmons is unconscious, and Fitz is almost out of bullets. He sighs, making a disgusted face at his blood crusted hands.  

“You just had to go and get shot, didn’t you?” He jokes, but his voice is thin. If Jemma had been awake she would have seen right through the false levity. He hears footsteps outside the door and stills, sighing in relief when they pass. He looks around him, trying to find some way out of this nightmare of a mission. There’s an air duct in the ceiling, but trying to crawl through it while dragging Simmons would be next to impossible. The closet is stocked with cleaning supplies, paper, light bulbs, and other various office items. He looks down at Jemma, still covered in blood and paler than ever. He gets to work.

Twenty minutes later he has three bombs made out of chemicals and light bulbs tied to his belt and is just finishing bandaging Simmons’ side with paper towels and duct tape. He’s also taken the knife she keeps in her boot and slid it up his sleeve.

“Sorry about this, Jemma,” he says, tucking his gun into his belt before bending down to pick her up. He throws her over his shoulder, grabs the bottle of pressurized window cleaning spray that he rigged, and opens the door.

There’s no one outside the closet, but he can hear voices around the corner, so he turns the other direction, walking as quietly as he could. He almost makes it to the stair case before he’s seen. It’s an employee, unarmed thankfully, but he quickly figures out that Fitz is the shooter the guards are looking for. Fitz switches the bottle to the hand that’s holding Jemma’s legs and draws his gun just as the man opens his mouth to yell.

“Don’t,” he commands. “Or I will shoot you.” The man’s eyes are wide, staring at the gun in terror, his hands up. Fitz walks around him, the barrel of the gun never wavering from its target between the man’s eyes. He pushes the metal door open with his hip, keeping eye contact with the man until it swings closed between them. He turns and runs down the stairs as fast as he can, knowing that the guards would be alerted within seconds.

Jemma’s weight slows him down, and he is only able to get to the fourth floor before shouts begin to echo in the stair well. There’s a pair of guards on the flight above him, and they lean over the rail and spot him almost instantly. Fitz grabs one of the light bulbs from his belt and throws it up and over the railing. He hears glass shatter, but doesn’t wait to see how effective the little bomb is.

He makes it to the third floor when the door bursts open and three guards come spilling in. Two draw their guns, but one pulls back his fist and drives it right into Fitz’s jaw. He stumbles, surprised, Jemma slipping precariously on his shoulder. He raises his spray bottle, jaw aching and stars blooming in his vision, and aims right for the man’s eyes. The guard yells in pain and staggers far enough away for the other two to move forward, both training their guns on Fitz.

He lunges, grabbing the nearest man’s wrist and slamming it into the wall, forcing him to drop his gun. The other guard moves forward, but Fitz spins, hitting him in chest with Jemma’s heels before kicking him backward into the other two guards. Taking advantage of their momentary daze, he turns and runs.

From the sound of the stampeding feet above him, there are at least ten men running after him. Just as he turns the corner of a set of stairs, he pulls the last two bombs from his belt and throws them up to the landing above him. He hears them shatter and then coughing and cursing. He smiles, just a little.

There are two men rushing up to meet him when he rounds the next corner and he manages to spray one in the eyes and mouth with window cleaner before the bottle is knocked from his hand. The other guard, a man at least six inches taller than Fitz and twice as broad, sneers at him before pulling his gun and taking aim. Fitz reaches into his sleeve and pulls out Jemma’s knife by the hilt, not pausing to take aim before throwing it. The guard crumples and Fitz rushes on, taking just a moment to knock out the other man, who is still barely able to open his eyes, by smashing his head into the metal railing.

After recovering his bottle from the next flight of stairs, and spraying one more guard in the face, he finally reaches the garage level, where a car is supposed to be waiting for them. He flies through the door, and then brings his gun down on the handle until it breaks, hopefully causing enough of a delay to the remaining guards that he could find the car.

He sets off, taking mental stock of himself. His jaw is throbbing from the punch, but he doubts it was fractured. He had twisted his left ankle during one of the skirmishes and his arm is stinging from a cut he couldn’t remember getting. He’s out of breath and his arms and back ache from carrying Jemma, but there is nothing life threatening. In fact, he’s gotten off relatively unharmed. Simmons, on the other hand…. Fitz had been able to ignore his worry for her as he planned and fought his way out of the building, but now that he was almost out of danger it was hard to ignore. She’d been unconscious for a long time and had lost a lot of blood. Even now he can feel it seeping into his shirt.

He finds the car quickly, and lays Jemma in the back seat as carefully as he can while still being quick. Then Fitz peels out the parking garage and doesn’t take his foot off the gas until they get to a hospital.

They put her on a cot in a room with twelve other people and Fitz sits by her bedside, playing absently with the little bead bracelet around his wrist. They stitched her up, pumped her full of someone else’s blood, and gave her a dose of morphine. She wakes up once, looking at him with dull, half-lidded eyes.

“How’d we get out?” She asks and his shoulders slump. He was hoping she wouldn’t ask. But it’s Jemma. She always asks.

“By killing a lot of people,” he responds and drops his head onto the bed beside her.

“Did you get the drive?” Her hand is in his hair and he knows it’s the morphine, but he’s grateful. He nods against the rough sheets. “Then you saved a lot of people.”

He takes three deep breaths, then sits up and looks at her. She’s fighting to keep her eyes open, and her face is still pale, but she looks better already.

“Get some sleep,” he says, because he doesn’t know how else to say that this was probably the worst day of his life. “We’ll leave in the morning.”

_“We believe that the strengths that we have discussed will be beneficial to your partnership and that, together, you will do a lot of good in the name of SHIELD.”_

There’s a small SHIELD facility in Avignon, France that goes radio silent in the middle of a high priority asset transport. Two hours later, they get a ransom call. Fitz and Simmons are in Barcelona, just finishing up an easy mission. They’re picked up within the hour and flown in. When they asked where their strike team was, they were told there wasn’t time to gather one. They are on their own, with only a quick look at the schematics of the building, four guns, and a few knives.

They get in through a bathroom window on the first floor. It was the only point of entry with no alarm. Fitz drops through first; rolling into a crouch, gun already up. They clear each corner before going around it, guns always at the ready. They don’t know how many hostages there are, but they know it could be as many as twenty people. There’s too much at stake to be lax. They search the entire first floor methodically, but find nothing.

Just as they’re about to ascend the stairs to the second floor, Fitz gently grabs Jemma’s wrist, his fingers catching on the little bead bracelet there, and turns her towards him.

“Jemma,” he says in a quietly desperate voice. She looks at him, wide eyes searching his, looking for the fear that she knows he has buried because operatives aren’t supposed to be afraid.

“I know, Fitz,” she says when she finds it. She knows she should let him say what he wants to; let him give the speech that every agent has prepared for the mission that goes wrong. But she isn’t sure she could listen to it, to his goodbye, and still walk up those stairs with her gun in her hand.

“No, Jemma, listen.” He sounds so insistent, so sure that he will never get a chance to say these words again that she has to blink away tears. She shakes her head, but he doesn’t seem to care. “I…. Don’t be a hero, Jemma. I know you think it’s your job, but we can always find another way. Please, please, don’t… don’t get hurt again. Please.”

“Oh, Fitz. We’ll be ok,” she promises, and she wants to put the gun in her hands down and never pick it up again, just so he’ll stop looking at her like that.

He closes his eyes for a moment. Then he steps forward and wraps his arms around her shoulders. She can feel the handle of his gun pressing against her shoulder blade and he smells like gunpowder and sweat, but she curls into him, pressing her face into his chest, and breaths him in. His free hand is on her neck, pressing her more firmly to him. He whispers her name into her hair in a broken voice and she shivers against him. She takes a deep breath; so does he. They pull apart, turn, and run up the stairs. 

“One, two, three,” Fitz mouths and they both step around the corner, guns raised. The hallway is clear and Fitz inclines his head, indicating for Simmons to go ahead. She steps carefully, clearing every room before proceeding. Fitz follows, walking backwards, covering her blindside. They see no one and, rather than relax them, it puts them both on edge. They’re sure they should have seen someone by now.

Just as they were beginning to wonder if the call had been a ruse, some kind of mistake, Jemma peers around a corner and then jerks back suddenly. Fitz looks at her with wide eyes and she nods.

“How many?” he asks her silently. She holds up eight fingers.

“Any other exits?” She shakes her head.

“How many hostages?” She holds up four fingers and he breathes a sigh of relief. Then they look at each other for a long moment, trying to decide on a plan without actually speaking. It takes them a moment, but they seem to agree. Jump in, guns blazing, and pray. They both draw their second gun.

Jemma nods at Fitz and he nods back. Then they dive around the corner, one gun in each hand, and take aim. All eight men jump up, grabbing their guns and cursing. Fitz shoots the closest man in the leg and he goes down screaming. Jemma gets another one in the shoulder. One fumbles with his gun, fires, and misses, giving Jemma enough time to shoot him in the stomach. Fitz shoots another in the arm. They return fire, forcing Simmons to dive back behind the corner.

“Drop your weapons and we won’t kill you,” Fitz shouts in French. The four men still standing all immediately grab for their guns and Simmons shoots one in the foot. He screams, hopping around a bit before falling. Fitz kicks his gun away from him.

The hostages had all been ducking and covering their heads as well as they could. Jemma runs over to them, both guns still trained on the thugs, stepping in front of them as best she could.

“There’s a knife in my boot,” she says in French and feels someone reach for it with fumbling hands. “Cut yourselves out and then run. We’ll cover you.”

They do as they’re told without hesitation, and she and Fitz keep themselves between the fleeing hostages and the kidnappers. Four of the eight have already passed out from blood loss or pain, a fifth is slumped over, his foot bleeding profusely. The three who remain standing seem unwilling to risk getting shot, but as each hostage flees, that reluctance seems to fade. Finally, as the last woman is cutting the tape at her feet, they lose their patience. They each grab their guns and shoot. Fitz and Simmons dive to the floor and there’s a scream of pain.

“Jemma!” Fitz shouts, turning to look at her, alarm all over his face.

“I’m fine,” she says, already steadying her aim on the three men. Fitz turns to look behind him and sees the woman, the last hostage, on the ground, a gaping bullet wound in her leg. “Go get her,” Jemma says.

“I’m not leaving you here,” he immediately responds. His heart is pounding, the fear that Jemma had been hurt _again_ when he was supposed to protect her making his legs weak.

“She can’t walk and I can’t carry her. I’ll cover you. Go get her.”

He wants to protest, wants to swear to her that he’ll never leave her side, that he’ll never let her get hurt again. But her eyes are steely and she’s right. Their mission is to save the hostages. He starts to run towards the bleeding woman and finds himself wanting to kiss Jemma Simmons very badly.

Jemma walks with him, backwards, with her guns trained on the three men who were still conscious. Fitz bends and scoops the woman up. Just as he does, the men surge forward, raising their guns, running towards the three agents. Fitz curls himself around the injured woman in a vain attempt to protect her from the attack.

“Fitz, run.” Jemma fires two shots and the men fall back. He does. He dashes to the staircase he and Jemma had come up, the woman whimpering with every step, but not saying anything. He flies down the stairs, turning back just once to check on Jemma. She’s not there. He bites back the terror and dashes towards the front doors. He sees the other four hostages standing around the door, trying to break the padlock on it with a stapler from the front desk.

“Take her,” he commands the man standing nearest to him and shifts the weight of the woman to his arms. “Stand back.” He pulls his gun and shoots the padlock until in falls off. The five hostages rush out, one of them radioing SHIELD on a small handheld radio Fitz had handed her. He follows, bringing a small first aid kit he found behind the desk. He tasks one of the freed hostages to do what he can for the injured woman, then turns and sprints back to the building.

He’s prepared to run all the way to where he last saw Jemma, but when he enters, he sees her walking down the stairs, both guns holstered. When she sees him, she smiles. He stops short, breath catching in his throat because she’s alive and beautiful and he wasn’t sure he’d ever see her like that again. He takes in a shuddering breath, then rushes up the stairs to meet her halfway.

He wants to kiss her, or to pull her into his arms and rejoice in the fact that they were alive. Instead, he stops one step below her and freezes.

“I made sure the men wouldn’t escape,” she says into the silence. He nods. “Are all the hostages alright?” He nods again.

“Fitz,” she says and that breaks the spell. He smiles at her. She smiles back and then says, voice full of wonder and pure relief, “We’re so lucky to be alive, Fitz. I thought we were dead for sure.”

“Jemma,” he says finally, looking at her standing one step above him, beaming at him, a small scrape on her face, the hair falling out of her pony tail. He takes that one step up, turning to face her. Then he kisses her. Hard. Because he’s never been so happy to see anyone in his entire life and she had smiled at him like she had just had that exact same thought. Because he’d been wondering for a long time what it would be like to kiss her. Because there was not enough fear left in him to dread rejection. Because they had just taken on eight armed men with no plan, no backup, no escape route and won. Because the day she had gotten shot in Guatemala had felt like the end of the world. Because she had been a hero and he had always loved that as much as he hated it.

He cups her jaw, firm and confident, but only for a moment. Then the pressure eases, until his hands are all but hovering above her skin. The kiss softens, slows. Her grip on the front of his shirt tightens, as if she is physically trying to restrain him from drawing back. He does, though, and, when they each have returned to themselves enough, they open their eyes.

Jemma is smiling, just like she had when she’d come down the stairs, like she had when they first met. Fitz is red-faced, all his bravado disappearing into embarrassment.

The sound of helicopter blades in the distance can be heard, but neither of them move. It seems they are both unwilling to ruin this moment, when they both feel like they’re standing on the edge of a precipice, deciding if they’re going to retreat to the safe side or to dive into the unknown.

“Fitz,” Jemma says, sounding more scared of this second than marching into a room with eight men ready to kill her. He blinks as if coming out of a trance, stutters for a moment, and gestures in the air as if distressed.

“I’m sorry, Jemma,” he says suddenly, tripping over his words in his haste. Jemma opens her mouth to speak, but he continues. “I shouldn’t have done that, I was just relieved that you were alive and…”

“Is that the only reason you kissed me?” She asks, looking offended.

“Is that what you want to be the reason?”

“No,” she says so sincerely that Fitz lets out a quick puff of air.

“Then, no,” he says, and they both seem to stop for a second, realizing the impact that this single action was going to have on them. Jemma’s nodding slowly, biting her lip. And then, slowly, she reaches up and runs her fingers through his hair. Then she pushes herself onto her toes, takes a breath, and kisses him.

It’s less adrenaline fueled, less desperation and surprise. But it still takes Fitz a moment to respond. Jemma laughs against his mouth as she feels his arms circle around her waist so tightly that he almost pulls her off her feet and presses even closer.

Jemma pulls back, nods a little to herself. Then she turns and walks out to greet the extraction team. Fitz smiles, rubs the back of his neck, and follows.

_“We expect to see great things from you.”_


End file.
